One Day Her Life Began
by Gorramit Girl
Summary: A collection of drabbles and ficlets from the "Rose Tyler Comment Ficathon" on LiveJournal.  If Rose isn't your cup of tea, best to stay away.  So far it includes Nine/Rose & Ten.5/Rose.
1. To the Light

**Disclaimer**: Doctor Who and its accoutrements are the property of the BBC and copyright of Russel T. Davies and Steven Moffat. This is a work of fanfiction. No copyright infringement is intended.

**Author's Notes**: Nine/Rose. This was inspired by a prompt by **Burnmybridges**.

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**To the Light**

He brings her along because he sees something in her. He's not sure what it is, and that's part of the fascination for him. He loves a good puzzle and that's exactly what she is.

He doesn't let her in, doesn't tell her about himself. He just shows off (he IS so impressive, of course) and plays his role because how could he possibly trust her with his past, with the things he's done, the things he regrets? And if he could, how could he ever burden her with that knowledge? She'd run, screaming in horror. Or maybe toss her head and sneer at him. (He's been on the receiving end of both before, and he still doesn't have a preference.)

It's selfish on his part and more than a bit manipulative (he's never claimed to be a saint), but he takes her to the end of her world.

She's out of her element, but she tries to gain her footing and stand on her own two feet. She challenges him, something that no one has done since before. She nearly dies and even though she's in danger, she doesn't lose her spark and he's grateful for that. Seeing others fight helps this him fight, helps him remember that there are things still worth fighting for.

She sees the destruction, feels pain at the loss. He can feel her grief and compassion long before he stands in the doorway and sees her staring at the floating bits of burned earth in space. He hears her words and he realizes that she gets it. She understands, on some small level. She _knows_, as much as she can know.

He tells her part of his story, shares with her part of the burden that's weighed him down and made him feel every bit of his 900 something years.

She doesn't run in horror, doesn't look down her nose at him, just sort of offers her companionship in a way that he's sure he'd never get from anyone else. She just sort of lets him know that she'll be there for him for as long as he wants her to be, and it's amazing to him to have that sort of trust laid at his feet.

She has this blinding light about her, and he can't help but be drawn to it. He wants to drown in her light, help her light grow brighter. Maybe it's selfish and cruel of him to be around her, because he's done so many horrible things, but when he's around her, when he's around Rose, he gets this feeling that maybe, just maybe, he'll be okay.

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Questions, comments, and _constructive_ criticism are greatly appreciated!


	2. Brilliant

**Disclaimer**: Doctor Who and its accoutrements are the property of the BBC and copyright of Russel T. Davies and Steven Moffat. This is a work of fanfiction. No copyright infringement is intended.

**Author's Notes**: Ten.5/Rose. Inspired by a prompt by **Sapphire_Child**.

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**Brilliant**

Afterward he asks her if she will be okay.

She can't answer him, not now, not when it somehow feels like a ghost of the worst day of her life all over again.

She never does answer him, even as she smiles at him and kisses him and holds onto him as if she can never (will never) let him go.

He knows why she feels the way she does, because he feels it too, feels almost cheated even though he has the one person he loves most right beside him, living with him day after day.

But he has her. He has her.

It doesn't quite take the pain away, though. But he knows what pain is and he's really, truly learning what love is (After all, hadn't she been teaching him since they met that night in a London shop?), and he'll take the lingering pain if it means having her love like he's wanted for so long.

Eventually the pain fades as the love grows and strengthens, until he's sure that nothing could ever be as wonderful and right as this.

"Are you going to be okay?"

"I have you, don't I?" she asks with a smile.

"For what it's worth, yes. But I can't show you the stars and I can't take you to all those fantastic places."

"So don't."

"But-"

"You love me, don't you?"

"More than anything."

"I don't need you to show me stars. I just need you to love me."

"I do. Oh, Rose, I do."

"I'll be okay. I'll be more than okay. I'll be brilliant. _We'll_ be brilliant." Her tongue peeks from between her teeth and he feels a tug in the heart he never thought he'd have but wouldn't trade for anything.

She's right, of course. His Rose always does know.

They are brilliant. The Doctor and Rose, brilliant. Like they always are.

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Questions, comments, and _constructive_ criticism are greatly appreciated.


	3. Different, Impossible

**Disclaimer**: Doctor Who and its accoutrements are the property of the BBC and copyright of Russel T. Davies and Steven Moffat. This is a work of fanfiction. No copyright infringement is intended.

**Author's Notes**: AU!Nine/KindaAU!Rose. Inspired by a prompt by **Nylana**.

This one is really out there, and it may be an idea that I expand upon one day in the future, because I find it rather intriguing. For now, though, this drabble is all there is.

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**Different, Impossible**

Lately there's this feeling she gets deep in the pit of her stomach. It's the kind of feeling that something just isn't quite right, that things are supposed to be different, somehow.

But she's a Tyler, and her life is exactly as it should be: Vitex heiress, daughter of Pete and Jacqueline Tyler, Torchwood agent. Nothing's wrong with her, with her life.

Maybe the dreams are just stress, she thinks.

After all, there's no such thing as time travel, and there's no way she could possibly have spent two years traveling with an alien (who can change his appearance, no less) in a blue box that's impossibly bigger on the inside. She works for Torchwood, and she's _seen_ things, of course, but honestly, some ideas are simply ridiculous.

She has her family. She has her friends Mickey and Jake. She has a challenging job that she loves — that she's good at.

Nothing's missing, nothing at all.

So she ignores the intense gaze of the new agent down in research, with his deep blue eyes — eyes that she'd dreamed about drowning in for months before he'd arrived with his northern accent, penchant for leather jackets, and sarcastic demeanor — and carries on as if she doesn't dream of falling through blackness and standing on a beach and hearing the unearthly song of burning like the sun in her mind.

But sometimes, late at night after a dream has plagued her, she'll gaze at the silver fob-watch on her mantle that Pete had given her — a family heirloom, he'd said — and wonder just why the idea of time and space with an alien (better with two, she thinks) seems so impossibly right.

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Questions, comments, and _constructive_ criticism are greatly appreciated!


	4. We Were Fantastic

**Disclaimer**: Doctor Who and its accoutrements are the property of the BBC and copyright of Russel T. Davies and Steven Moffat. This is a work of fanfiction. No copyright infringement is intended.

**Author's Notes**: Season 2 Nine/Rose. Based on a prompt by **Juliet316**, where it's Nine with Rose on _Doomsday_.

I haven't watched _Doomsday_ yet, so I pretty much wrote what I'd like to see in a Nine/Rose _Doomsday_ parting, based on what I know about the episode.

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**We Were Fantastic****  
**  
He's going to be there. She knows he is. She's _dreamed_ it, and that's what the dream had meant and he's going to be there. He is her Doctor and he's saved her and she's saved him and he's going to be there.

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It's cold and the spray of the mist from the ocean bites at her exposed face and hands, but she doesn't care because he's going to be here. She doesn't know what it all means, but that doesn't matter. He's going to be here.

She knows her mum and Pete think she's crazy and even Mickey, after seeing what he's seen with her and the Doctor, wonders if Rose isn't finally having her breakdown.

He's going to be here. She can feel it. She can feel _him_.

"Rose Tyler."

She turns and there he is. Standing there just like she remembers him, leather jacket and big ears and smile… he stands there like a ghost.

"Doctor." It's all she can manage, because when she really looks, all he is is a ghost, a hologram. Her heart plummets in her chest and she feels the panic she'd once felt at his image another time, the time she'd nearly lost him.

"Am I coming in clear? I lost my mallet so I don't have anything to hit the console with." He smiles sadly as he approaches her.

"What's going on?" she asks, reaching out to touch him, only to have her hand go right through his chest.

"I'm not really here, Rose. I'm just an image. Here," he fizzles out of view and she sobs before he appears in front of her clear as day. He puts his hand up, palm out and even knowing that he's not really there, she brings her hand up to join his, though all it's doing is touching air. "Better?"

Rose trembles. "I can't touch you, Doctor. I can't touch you and it hurts."

"I know." There's so much sorrow in his voice that she nearly breaks down.

"I know it hurts, I feel it too. You look well."

"I'm managing. Mum and Dad are well and there's going to be a baby. Mickey's still here."

"Baby? Jackie and Pete-"

"Yeah, Mum and Dad really…" she trails off at the barely stifled grimace across the Doctor's face.

"Ah. And what about you, Rose Tyler?"

"I've been working at Torchwood. They need agents and I can't just sit around watching telly all day."

He smiles at her, proud and sad at the same time. "Rose Tyler, always fantastic, always defending the world."

"It's not the same. It's something, but it's not the same." She shouldn't be talking like this, it's hard enough on him, she can see.

"Change is the only thing we can't stop."

"Doesn't make it any easier," Rose says quietly.

"No, it doesn't."

"How are you even here?" She doesn't understand, the breach had closed, had stayed closed even after she had pounded against the wall until her fists had bleed, had stayed closed even when she'd rested her face against the cool surface, her running mascara staining it's blue paint.

"The breaches in the walls of reality are closing, trying to heal themselves after the damage Torchwood wrought. I was able to find this one, though it won't last long. But I couldn't leave it like this, Rose. I had to find a way."

"If everything is sealing up, how are you speaking to me? How did you find me?"

"Find the right power source, and I did — dead clever, me — it's only a matter of jiggering and poking to get a message through." He doesn't quite meet her eyes, but she sees the guilt in them before he drops his gaze away.

"What kind of power source?" This can't be happening. She can't be trapped here, away from him, for the rest of forever. Surely he'd found some way… It isn't supposed to be like this. "What could be that powerful?"

"A sun going supernova. I found a big enough star and I… I forced it to go supernova. It's burning up right now, it's burning its life out just so I can say goodbye." His voice is cracked, like all he wants to do is break down, and his eyes beg her to forgive him for the destruction he's doing to the doomed power source.

Of course she forgives him. It's never a question.

"That's what this is? Goodbye?" She feels the onslaught of tears and she's not strong enough to stand against them.

"I had to see you once last time." The sadness in his blue eyes pierces right through her heart and more than anything she wishes she could take his hand and hold him.

"This can't be goodbye, Doctor. We were going to do so much more." The tears are falling freely down her face and she stands still as his ghost hand reaches up to cup at her face, as if he can wipe away her tears.

"We were fantastic, Rose. We were absolutely fantastic."

"I-I I love you." It's all she can manage, and as the tears fall freely down his face she knows he feels the same way.

"Oh, oh, Rose Tyler, I-"

His image cuts out. He is gone.

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Rose Tyler stands at Bad Wolf Bay, crying, alone.

Elsewhere, in a reality she can never return to, the Doctor stands in his TARDIS, crying, alone.

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Questions, comments, and _constructive_ criticism are greatly appreciated.


End file.
